


A Singular Bear

by anonymousdaredevils



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Comfort Objects, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, happiness, silliness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-01
Updated: 2015-06-01
Packaged: 2018-04-02 08:48:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4053919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousdaredevils/pseuds/anonymousdaredevils
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Matt holds the bear well away from himself, as though worried about getting her covered in... in everything <b>he's</b> covered in, which, all right, Claire is going to start billing him for all the cleaning supplies this couch soaks up.</i>
</p><p>For a prompt on the Daredevil kink meme:</p><p>One night when Claire's trying to patch Matt up he's seriously upset for whichever reason and not cooperating. Before he hurts her or himself ever further, Claire desperately tries to find something to help and ends up grabbing a teddy bear she accidentally never gave to a hospital toy drive and shoving it into his arms.</p><p>(Full prompt and warnings in the preliminary note.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. in which Claire's neighbors are sound sleepers

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt:
> 
> "Matt, Matt/Happiness, comfort object
> 
> One night when Claire's trying to patch Matt up he's seriously upset for whichever reason and not cooperating. Before he hurts her or himself ever further, Claire desperately tries to find something to help and ends up grabbing a teddy bear she accidentally never gave to a hospital toy drive and shoving it into his arms.
> 
> It's soft, and nice to squeeze, and Matt calms down quickly and ends up getting really attached to the teddy bear, using it as a comfort object.
> 
> :)"
> 
> Fluff and silliness and a little bit of angst, and also a couple of non-graphic descriptions of kind of gruesome wounds. I aimed for happy but this is still Matt Murdock's life we're talking about, after all.

Claire has had a long day. Most of her days feel long, lately, and she's been out of the city and back but her fingers still twitch for a bat that she won't allow herself to carry in broad daylight.  
  
She's been  _busy_ , and she's  _tired_ , and there is an injured vigilante flailing around on her couch.  
  
Injured vigilante on the couch – okay, fine, she shouldn't be used to that but she really is. The flailing is new, and worrying, and at this point if she gets hit in the face she can't promise she isn't going to hit back( _do no harm, do no harm, do no harm_ , she recites,  _compassion, compassion,_ _compassion_ ).  
  
“Matt," she hisses, heart pounding, trying to keep at least one ear attuned to her surroundings because _neighbors_ , "Matt, I need to know where the  _blood_  is coming from!  _Matt_!” She's just off a double shift and it's frankly a miracle she hasn't slipped and whispered,  _MIKE!_  
  
He's hyperventilating, exhaling gasps and sobs and getting hardly any air back in, but he's still  _moving_ , aggravating any wounds he might have and running a real risk of punching her  _or_  himself with very, very strong fists. At least she managed to get his gloves off. His very, very hard gloves.  
  
His gloves are off.  
  
She has an idea.  
  
She bought ten stuffed animals last month for a toy drive at the hospital. One fell out of the box and has been living on her bookshelf ever since, and she risks leaving Matt's side long enough to grab it.  
  
It's a bear, brand new and soft, a little understuffed and a little smaller than a throw pillow, and she shoves it into Matt's hands and says, “Hold this for me, will you?”  
  
Matt stops flailing, keeps shaking, unclenches one fist just far enough to grab the bear by a leg. Claire takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly, waiting. Hoping.  
  
“Claire.” Matt's voice is hoarse and he is still breathing wrong. “Claire. Sorry. Panicked. It's – My shoulder, right shoulder, knife went through the armor, must've... been a bad angle. I don't – know why I – I'm sorry, I didn't –”  
  
“Sh.” Claire peers at his shoulder, sees the tear in the suit now that she can take a closer look, and, oh. Ouch. Well. Matt has never asked her to sugar-coat anything. “...I think a piece of the knife broke off in your skin.”  
  
“I know,” he grits out. “Can you just –“  
  
“We'll have to take the armor off,” she says.  
  
Matt does not look or sound thrilled with this plan.  
  
“I don't have anything that can cut this,” Claire says, patiently, and helps him sit up. “Just try to hold still, only move when I move you. I'll be careful.”  
  
It's a slow process, but in the end, the upper armor is off, and Claire has already cut away part of Matt's undershirt when she realizes he is stretching the fingers of his left hand out for something.  
  
She looks down. The bear is on the floor.  
  
“Her name is Truffles,” she says, handing it back to him. “She's a teddy bear, brown with black eyes and a purple ribbon tied in a bow around her neck, and she came with the name. Keep holding still and you can take her home.”  
  
“Hm.” Matt holds the bear well away from himself, as though worried about getting her covered in... in everything  _he's_  covered in, which, all right, Claire is going to start billing him for all the cleaning supplies this couch soaks up.  
  
She works quietly and he offers no commentary, no complaints. When it's done, when the metal is out and disposed of and Claire has disinfected and stitched Matt's shoulder with steady hands that she decides, after this many hours awake, she is allowed to be proud of, he is still holding Truffles.  
  
“Thank you,” he says quietly, and carefully moves his right arm – just far enough to hold the bear in both hands now. His fingers roam over the ears, slightly softer on the inside, Claire remembers, and the smooth, half-bead plastic eyes, and the soft, round nose. He finds the ribbon and toys with it. Turns his head to face Claire and cracks a smile. “...Can I really keep this?”  
  
His voice cannot be soft, not after all his struggling and those ragged, gasping breaths. His voice is  _rough_ , but quiet, and the little of his face that she can see under the mask seems... uncertain.  
  
He is completely serious. And possibly afraid she's going to laugh at him.  
  
She answers completely seriously, and does not laugh at him: “You can do whatever you want. You can even sleep on my couch if you get the blood and grime and... and  _Hell's Kitchen_  off of it tomorrow. I'm going to bed.”

* * *

She wakes up to a sofa covered in drying spots of upholstery cleaner.  
  
Vigilante and bear are noticeably absent.

* * *

“I'm getting pictures from an unknown number, Matt.”  
  
“ _What_ –”  
  
The panic from his end of the call makes her feel a little bad about opening with that, so she interrupts him: “Pictures of Truffles.”  
  
“...Oh.”  
  
“She's mostly posed on top of dangerously high surfaces, like desks, and filing cabinets. I'm worried for her safety.”  
  
“ _Foggy_ ,” Matt growls.  
  
Claire still does not laugh. But she smiles, and hopes it comes through in her voice. “I thought so. At least you washed the blood out.”


	2. in which Matt probably fell off that bar stool

“I mean, at least your name's not any variation of 'Beary,'” Matt says to the stuffed bear sitting on his kitchen counter.  
  
It's been a few weeks since he brought Truffles home. He has made as much progress as he thinks he ever will in ignoring Stick's voice in his head –  _surrounding yourself with soft stuff isn't life, it's death_  – but the name is proving to be a real obstacle. He can hardly bring himself to say it. It's just too... It's a  _food_. Isn't it? Matt is reasonably sure truffles are a kind of food.  
  
It's not even that. It's the plural. Truffles. It crosses some kind of line he isn't willing to examine too closely, a line which might also be Stick's fault and which involves words like  _cute_.

“Truffle,” he says aloud, and yes. Truffle. He can live with Truffle.

* * *

He pretends to himself for a long time that he's not going to sleep with the damn thing.

He wakes gasping and by the time he has completely sorted through the mess of sounds and smells and tastes and textures and figured out what is real and what is dream and what is memory – he has already thrown himself out of bed, is already halfway to the dresser.  
  
He makes it to his knees long enough to grab the bear, and then he sinks back down to the floor and  _squeezes_.  
  
Truffle is soft, and pliant, and Matt knows he will not hurt her no matter how hard he squeezes, as long as he does not  _pull_.  
  
Matt leans back against the dresser and concentrates on breathing until it starts to feel normal. In his mind's eye, there is a face, well-remembered, clouding out.  
  
“Truffle,” he whispers, holding the bear close against his chest. “Have I have ever told you about my dad?”

* * *

Claire seems to enjoy the pictures, so Matt lets Foggy keep sending them. He even poses for one, Truffle balanced very carefully on his shoulder as he balances very carefully (and only slightly inebriated) on a kitchen bar stool.

* * *

He is startled to find himself in a routine, but it is a nice one to have.  
  
He comes home from a day of being Matt Murdock the lawyer, taps the bear's hard plastic eyes with his fingertips and chatters aimlessly at her about his work, his day, his plans, as he goes about the business of either settling in or (more often) setting out for the night.  
  
He comes home from a night of being Daredevil, washes the blood and grime away, crawls into bed, and says nothing. He is too tired for words. He clutches the bear to his chest and she is still there in the morning.  
  
Sometimes he speaks to her, then.  
  
Sometimes he doesn't.

* * *

“I –  _augh_  – I renamed the bear,” Matt says conversationally, as Claire sews up a gash in his leg.  
  
“Good,” she says, without pausing. “What do you call her?”  
  
“...Truffle,” Matt admits, realizing belatedly that he has no good explanation as to  _why_.  
  
Claire stops, pulls the needle safely away from his skin. She is shaking. Laughing. Matt grins.  
  
“You know,” she says, recovering herself a moment later and getting back to work on the suture, “somehow that's better.”

* * *

Matt Murdock comes home from a long day of being Matt Murdock, gets halfway through pulling out Daredevil's body armor, and stops.  
  
“You know what?” he says, to nobody in particular, because he left Truffle in his bedroom this morning. “I just  _really_  don't feel like it tonight.”  
  
He stows the body armor back in its hiding place, puts on pajamas instead. Brushes his teeth while mentally running over tomorrow's to-do list – they have a meeting with a potential client, notes to go through for their current case, and Karen has been talking about putting together a website. Yeah. All things he should definitely be  _awake_  for.  
  
He crawls into bed. He is lying on silk sheets and there is a stuffed bear a few inches from his left hand, and Stick's voice fills his head, reverberating disappointment:  _soft things_  
  
“Shut the fuck up, Stick,” Matt says cheerfully, grabs the bear, rolls over, and goes to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have written some wild things in my time but Matt Murdock saying "You know what? I just really don't feel like it tonight" probably takes the cake.


End file.
